LECTURE VIII.

SOCIETY THE SPHERE OF THE KINGDOM OF CHRIST ON EARTH.

THE first announcement of Christianity to the world contained in it a promise of a new order of Society. When the Divine Person that embodied and proclaimed this religion came forward, out of the retirements of Nazareth, to his public ministry, he came not only as the Regenerator and Redeemer of the individual heart, but as a Recreator of social institutions and the Saviour of states. Earlier yet, the anticipations of prophecy had described him as the Author of a commonwealth complete in compass, power, harmony, every civic glory. The The imagery imagery that pictured that foreseen. splendor was drawn from social reconciliations, swords beaten into ploughshares, Ethiopia stretching out her hands, the wolf lying down with the lamb, tyranny and hatred vanished from the family of nations. In these generous predictions we hear the mighty forechant of that universal anthem which is to rise from all the round world, Christianized and consecrated at last. The Messiah ex

pected was to be a Prince of unbroken peace, and of his brotherly kingdom there should be no end.

At his actual coming, these animating and benignant promises were more than confirmed. The first voice that declared his nativity, ringing nativity,―ringing through the midnight sky over Bethlehem,—the celestial chorus startling the shepherds,-was a song of hope for social man, as well as a "Gloria in Excelsis" to the Creator; for, after its first sublime ascription to Heaven, comes Heaven, comes instantly the "Peace on earth, good will to men.' Every supernatural sign spoke of human reformation. The Advent was a coming of the Son of God to weary, oppressed, sorrowing humanity. The Epiphany was a manifestation of the Father to an alienated, scattered household. The Passion was a redemptive suffering for a bleeding social body, no less than for lost solitary souls. Throughout all his benign ministry, Christ planted virtues which are the very binding and healing and building of the social state. With the clearest emphasis he affirmed that his mission was to rear a world-wide home for the tribes of the earth,-under one Father and one law," that they all might be one." To this purified and Christian society he gave a social name-the Church. Its organizing principle was to

be the spirit of his own life and gospel, wrought first into the convictions and thus into the whole development and conformation of the race.

The reach of time it will require to work this consummation out is never estimated. The uncertain and variable element is the freewill of man; the element fixed and sure is the decree of God. All we know of the period of the plan is that it is His with whom one day is as a thousand years. Whenever the result is accomplished, it will doubtless be through the voluntary consent of men themselves, who are to be the material as well as the architects of the structure.

In my last Lec

ture I endeavored to show that though the rate is not uniform, nor the progress equal as to place, the causes that shall finally work that Christian commonwealth into realization, act steadily and unceasingly, from age to age, with the constancy and the power of law.

Now the means by which this grand, ultimate destiny of mankind is to be achieved, we know. It is by the ideas and affections, i. e., by the spiritual forces,-planted germinally by the Creator in humanity, and manifested perfectly in the one Divine Man. In history we know them as Life; in the gospel as Truth. What we name Christianity is the clear and complete affirmation

of them by that mediatorial Being, in his action, in his speech, in his death, in his resurrection, in the eternal intercessory and inspiring office of his Lordship in the heavens. Thus the social constitution of man, and the revelation in Christ, are the two correlated, complemental forces, which bear forward the progress of the world. Together, they prepare that renewed, just, free, merciful and holy society which the New Testament repeatedly characterizes as the kingdom of heaven on earth, and which is the symbol, the archetype, and the beginning of that final and everlasting kingdom

which shall be when there shall be new heavens and a new earth. This, in as few terms as I am able to present it, is the key to the Christian philosophy of history.

It follows that when the great truths of Christianity shall have become embodied in the actual forms of government, education, trade, art, letters, mercy, manners and worship, and shall have controlled Society by their living power, then the kingdom of Christ will have come. Whether this result is ever is ever to be be an historical fact an on this planet, i. e., whether the human race is literally perfectible, or whether, in a state meant to be disciplinary and preparatory, it shall be realized only in approximate and ever-ascending degrees, is